INLAND Rail has certainly landed in Euroa with the management and plant site now well established as construction company John Holland begins preparations for some major changes along Railway Street.

Project director Scott Anderson said the two-year project was about to get underway by starting detour works on Brock Street and Burkett Street before a ‘flash mob’ upgrade of the level crossing.

“I think the message is simply that we have established on site and we’re about to begin,” Mr Anderson said.

“Upgrading the level crossing means we can, by mid-year, pull down Anderson Street Bridge.

“And then we will really get cracking on things for the rest of the year.”

The project aims to then replace the level crossing with a new and safer one in under 60 hours, a feat that Mr Anderson is confident will meet its target despite the size of such a logistic challenge.

“We have 60 hours to get into the Burkett Street level crossing, and we’re going to be working 24 hours a day.”

The two-and-a-half-day upgrade will require the removal of the old boom gates, ripping up tracks, and taking out signalling and cabling which will all need relocating.

“There’s these special joins that we’ve got to pull out and put back in again and they’re sort of a technical piece of work, so that takes a bit of time,” Mr Anderson said.

“And then we’ve got to put the whole thing back together, put the asphalt back on, get the line marking painted, and make sure that the boom gates work.

“Then we hand it back to the operator so that they can run trains on it."

Mr Anderson said the team was very confident of completing the task in the short time, with weather being 'no issue'.

“We have all sorts of contingencies in place for rain – we have done lots of planning to make sure it gets done.

“We do these sorts of things all the time.”